


it's just a little white lie

by the_incredible_doodler



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: Dungeons & Dumbasses: Tipsy Rogues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-21 11:10:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17641643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_incredible_doodler/pseuds/the_incredible_doodler
Summary: “I’m sorry, Spike,” a voice said through the spinning world around him.  He knew that voice.  Whose voice was that? That was his brother’s voice.  What had he done?  Why couldn’t he remember his brother’s name?  What was he doing in the woods?





	it's just a little white lie

**Author's Note:**

> A little story about my dnd character, Spike, and how he became the elf he is today.
> 
> (title inspired by the song "White Lie" by The Lumineers)

         The first time Spike got his hair cut was when he and his older brother Moose played a prank on their uncle. Spike loved his tribe with all his heart—all his friends and family were there after all—but getting your hair cut, for an elf, was the worst punishment for getting into deep trouble.

         “This is going to be incredible,” Moose whispered to Spike as they perched in a tree high above where they had lay their trap. His brother was the mastermind behind their plans, and Spike was the one that figured out how to make it work.

         It wasn’t that elaborate of a prank, a simple trip wire strung up to a bucket that would pour mud and acorns onto whoever triggered it. In hindsight, they probably should’ve been more careful about where the mud ended up when setting the prank, because when Moose nudged Spike to climb further up the tree, Spike’s mud-covered foot slipped, and he fell out of the tree. At least Spike was able to get a close-up reaction of his uncle’s face when both he and the bucket of mud he had knocked into fell on top of him.

         His uncle was so furious, he grabbed Spike by the arm and didn’t let go until he dragged him all the way back to Spike’s mother. Spike was shoved into a chair by his mother, who lectured him and grabbed a knife from the kitchen. She cut his beautiful, long hair up to his shoulders, big tears rolling down Spike’s still muddy cheeks the entire time.

 

—

 

         The second time Spike got his hair cut, it wasn’t even his fault.

         Moose had accidentally let loose all the chickens from their pen, something Spike was careful enough to never let happen. It caused chaos among the tribe as they scattered to gather all the loose creatures.  Their father dragged both of them back to the hut by their ears after the last chicken was recaptured.

         “Spike, I’m surprised you would do something like this,” his mother sighed disappointedly, as she looked down at him and Moose. His father was close behind, reading through a scroll and mixing together different medicinal herbs.

         “He was the last one in the pen before I went to feed them,” Moose pointed out, weaving his white lies like always, “Like I said, when I got back from getting the grain, they were gone!” Spike kept quiet the entire time, as much as it pained him. He’d rather that he take the blame instead of his brother. He knew how much his brother wanted to be one of the Elders of their enclave, and if his hair got cut now, he didn’t have a chance.  So, he took the fall.

         “Just take a finger-lengths off,” his father told his mother, “At this point, the Elders wouldn’t want him anyways,”

         The hard truth hit Spike like a stab to the chest. A part of him had still hoped that maybe, once Moose joined the Elders, there might still be some way he could join too. He wanted to be like his brother, and he wanted to experience the exclusive Inner Circle of their tribe too.

          “I’m sorry, Spike,” his mother said as she sat him down and began cutting his hair, “But you have to learn that there are consequences for your actions. You’ll find your place, even if it’s not with the Elders,” Spike didn’t speak a word as his hair was cut up to his chin.

 

—

 

         The first time Moose got his hair cut was the same incident that caused Spike to get a scar over his left eye.

         He and Spike were exploring the woods outside of their enclave when they came across a cave bear’s lair. They wandered inside and found a small bear cub, barely a few weeks old.  Spike immediately fell in love with the small, fluffy creature.  He cautiously approached it and pet it gently, careful not to wake it or disturb it too much.  Moose held back, not as good with creatures of the wild as his younger brother was.  He had, after all, managed to let all those chickens loose accidentally.

         The familiar spark of an idea went off in Moose’s brain.  He pulled his long hair up into a bun and he nudged Spike in the side, to signal to him that he had a plan.  Spike looked at him expectantly.

         “What if we take this cub back to the tribe and train it to be our companion?  Like how Aunt Erin has her hawk? And Cousin Nath has their wolf, you know? It’d be so cool!!” Moose explained quietly.  Spike frowned at him.

         “No, we can’t do that,” he replied, stepping between Moose and the cub, as if to protect it somehow.

         “Why not?  I’m sure the others will totally be jealous,” Moose replied, not sure why Spike didn’t understand yet.  Usually Spike just went with all his ideas, and this opposition was throwing Moose off.

         “It’s just a cub, Moose!  We can’t take it away from its mother, from its home!” Spike retorted, his voice rising.

         “Yes, we can!  The others do it all the time when they pick out their animal companions!”

         “No, they don’t!  Have you paid any attention?! They don’t take babies!  They take in the animals that are hurt and nurse them back to health and train them! Why don’t you understand?” the two of them are yelling now, causing the cub to stir awake without their notice.

         “Because I don’t understand why you don’t just go along with me on this, like all the other times!” Moose shouted.

 _“Because maybe I don’t want to take the blame for you again!”_ Spike screamed, stunning Moose.  Their fight was interrupted by a loud huffing from behind Moose.  He slowly turned to see the looming silhouette of the cave bear mother blocking the entrance to the cave.

         “Oh fu—" Moose is cut off by a deafening roar from the cave bear.  The two of them backed away from the mother bear as much as they could, running into the back of the cave.

         “What do we do?” Spike said, hovering close to the bear cub, as if to still protect it from him.

         “I thought you didn’t _want_ my plans anymore!” Moose snapped.

         “Well, I don’t want _to die!!”_ Spike said and was caught in the face by a claw swipe from the mother cave bear.  Spike cried out in pain as blood began spilling from the cut in his face.

         “C’mon, we got this!” Moose shouted, and threw a few punches at the mother cave bear, only getting a snap of teeth in return that he narrowly avoided.

 _“Are you crazy?!”_ Spike screamed, grabbing Moose and shoving him forward, past the mother cave bear.  The bear swiped at them again as they ran past, hitting Spike in the back.

         “We’re getting out of here!” Spike grimaced through the pain.  The two brothers ran out into the woods and didn’t stop running until they were a good distance from the cave.  They paused for only a second to catch their breath, and Moose finally saw the amount of damage Spike had sustained.

         “Spike…” Moose began.

         “Don’t talk to me,” Spike choked out.  He turned on him and ran the rest of the distance back to their enclave, trying not to cry.  Spike burst into his hut, startling his parents.  They jumped up and immediately began questioning what happened to him.

         “Moose and I... we found a bear cub, and he thought we should take it back here, but I said we shouldn’t, and the mom came back, and she attacked us, and—" Spike sputtered out the story between sobs.  His mother sat him down and began casting a healing spell to patch up the cuts on his back and his face.  She wiped away the blood from his eye, but it was still difficult for him to see.  Spike had a sinking feeling he wouldn’t be able to see from that eye again.

         “Do you think that’s going to be enough?” his father asked, worried.

         “I’m not sure…” his mother replied.  They shared a look, almost having a conversation through facial expressions that Spike couldn’t quite understand, before his mother hurriedly wrapped bandages around his eye.  She stood up and grabbed her Elder’s cloak, before helping Spike make his way outside, where they ran into Moose.  Their mother glared furiously at Moose and pointed at the door to the hut.  Moose glanced at Spike before heading inside, searching for some form of forgiveness in his face, but he didn’t make eye contact with him.

         Spike’s mother hurried him towards the outskirts of their enclave, a far away from both the nearby kingdom and their tribe’s borders.  She took him to a closed off area that Spike recognized as the meeting place for the Elders, the Inner Circle of their tribe.  He stopped just before the entrance, fearful of what may happen to him inside.

         “It’s alright,” his mother encouraged him, “ _Y_ ou can come in _._  We can help you here,” Spike tentatively walked into the lush clearing that was inside the magical barriers.  He had never seen it from the inside before, only from the outside where he and Moose frequently tried to spy on their meetings.  It was covered in the widest variety of plants and flowers he had ever seen.  A few Elders were in there, meditating or practicing spells, but they paid them no attention.

         “Sit down here,” his mother motioned to the ground, where Spike obediently sat.  She bent over to the ground and muttered a few enchantments before picking up a single deer antler from among the flowers.  She turned back to Spike, deer antler in hand.

         “Now, you mustn’t tell anyone about this, not even your brother.  Understand?” she said, looking at him intently.

         “Alright.” Spike lied, but his mother didn’t notice.  She was already beginning to murmur another enchantment.  The deer antler began glowing along with her hand, where magic sprung.

         “Now, don’t move,” she said, and delicately touched the bandages around Spike’s eyes.  He felt a warm sensation prickle his closed eye and run down the length of his cut.  It burned for a moment before dissipating, along with the rest of his mother’s spell.

         “How’s that?” she asked him, slowly and carefully unwrapping the bandages from his eye.  His vision was blurry at first, but he blinked it away.  Slowly but surely, his vision returned to almost the same to what it was before.

         “I can see again!” he rejoiced, and his mother smiled before hiding the precious deer antler away.  His mother made him thank the other Elders on their way out, and they returned back to their hut.  His mother went inside, but Spike stayed behind and found Moose out in the back.  His once perfect hair now hung in ragged strands that brushed his shoulders.

         Moose reluctantly looked up at his baby brother and his eyes widened when he saw what happened.  Spike’s eye that had gotten injured in the fight was no longer its normal shade of pale periwinkle.  It now glittered a dark silver-gray, almost blending in with his skin.

         “What happened to you?” Moose asked.

         “I could ask the same to you,” Spike murmured, poking Moose’s leg with his foot.

         “Fair enough,” he replied and stared back at the ground again, still angry with himself.  He’d come this far, only to mess up now.  There was no way the Elders would even consider looking over this one incident.

         “I saw the inside of the Inner Circle,” Spike mumbled, and Moose’s head shot up like a wild dog.  He stood up and grabbed Spike’s shoulders.

         “You _what?!”_ Moose nearly shrieked, “What was it like?  What do they have in there?  How do I get in there?” Panic began to rise in his chest.  How had his little brother made it inside of the Inner Circle before him?  That was his biggest goal in life, and Spike just waltzed in after Moose’s screw up.

         Spike told his older brother everything that he wanted to know about the inside of the Inner Circle, including about the magical deer antler the Elders possessed.  Moose immediately became fixated on this powerful artifact and was determined to find some way to take it for his own.  He determined that they needed to begin spying on the Elders’ meetings in order to find some way they could get past the magical barriers into the secretive heart of their tribe.  He wasn’t going to stop until he got inside, and he would take Spike with him if that’s what it took.

 

—

 

         The third time Spike’s hair was cut was the last time he and Moose spied on one of the Elders’ meetings. 

         He hadn’t been hidden enough when the Elders emerged after their meeting and ended up getting spot by one of the Elders, who pointed him out to his mother and father.  Moose had managed to stay hidden better than him and didn’t get caught.  His parents brought him back to their hut and sat him down again, asking what he had been doing there.

         “Spike, you don’t seem to understand that you can’t go there,” his father explained to him, over and over again.

         “I know you want to find out what secrets the Elders have, but if you found out that could jeopardize the entire structure and safety of our enclave.”  his mother continued, picking up the haircutting knife that Spike dreaded.  They cut his hair up to his ears this time—the shortest of anyone in the clan.  His mother crouched down in front of his chair afterwards.

         “I need you to promise me that you’ll drop this, and you won’t try to spy on the Elders again, alright?” she said.

         “Alright,” Spike lied, knowing Moose was already working on his grand plan.

 

—

 

         The last time Spike got his hair cut was the day everything went wrong.

         Moose was planning on sneaking into the Inner Circle all week, and they were waiting for the perfect opportunity to do it.  He wanted the fabled magical antler that he had only heard stories about from Spike.  They waited until after the Elders’ meeting had ended to sneak into the Inner Circle, when there weren’t as many people there.

         They used some old robes of their parents to get past the magical barriers, and Moose almost froze when he walked inside.  It was one of the most beautiful place Moose had ever seen, and he wanted more than anything to show it to the rest of his tribe.  His chances of being elder were crushed the day his hair was cut, so his only hope now was to bring the secrets of the Elders to the rest of the tribe.

         Spike elbowed Moose in the ribs, interrupting his trance, and brought him over to the patch where the deer antler was laid on the ground.  The few Elders that were there were meditating and didn’t hear them approach.  It seemed almost too simple.  Before Spike could stop him, Moose bent down and scooped up the antler.

 _“Wait!”_ Spike hissed, “Mom used enchantments on that last time.”

         “So what?  Nothing’s happened.” Moose whispered back.  As the words left his mouth, the few Elders there with them opened their eyes and stood up, rushing towards the two brothers.

         “Put down the sacred artifact!” one of them began to shout.

 _“Run!”_ Moose shouted and dashed for the entrance, Spike close behind.  They dashed between the few Elders there and made it out to see more Elders running back to where they had just left their meeting.  Moose swore and dashed off into the woods surrounding the area.  Spike scrambled to keep up with him.

         “What happened?” Moose shouted back to Spike.

         “They must have had an _Alarm_ spell on it!” Spike replied, trying to follow his brother at each random turn he made through the woods.  Moose pulled the silver thread that was wrapped around the antler and threw it behind his shoulder.

         “You’re right,” he grimaced.  The Elders were still on his tail.  He wasn’t going to make it.  His plan would fail again, unless...he did something to throw them off.  He grabbed Spike’s arm and pulled him in a different direction before stopping abruptly.  He placed his hand on Spike’s forehead and began channeling the _Modify Memory_ spell he had just learned.

         “Moose, what are you doing?” Spike looked panicked.

         “I’m sorry, Spike. I can’t let this plan fail. Not this one,” Moose said.  If he was going to get away, he couldn’t have Spike remembering what had happened.  The antler in Moose’s other hand began glowing.

         “No, you don’t understand.” Spike cried out in pain and began crying.  Moose shook his head, pressing his hand harder against Spike’s forehead.   _Forget, forget, forget_.

         “You can’t do that.  You can’t break down on me.” Moose shook his head more now, “I’m sorry, but I can’t let this fail.”

         Spike’s head felt like it was about to explode.  The magic rushing through his brain blurred his vision with tears, and he didn’t understand what was going on.  Every time he tried to think a coherent thought, it was interrupted by the loud rushing of magic, and he couldn’t remember what was happening.  Was he dying?

         “I’m sorry, Spike,” a voice said through the spinning world around him.  He knew that voice.  Whose voice was that? That was his brother’s voice.  What had he done?  Why couldn’t he remember his brother’s name?  What was he doing in the woods?

         Anytime he tried to provide an answer to the many questions in his mind, his brain only came back blank.  The answer was there, but the more he tried to think of it, the more he couldn’t remember.  What was happening?

         There were people here now.  Spike didn’t know who they were.  They were in some sort of robes, he believed.  He could barely see through the fountain of tears that was pouring out of his eyes.  Why was he crying?

         Spike struggled to keep consciousness as words were shouted at him, but nothing made sense, it was almost as if they were speaking a different language he couldn’t understand.  But he understood that language, right?  That was the language he spoke? What language was it?

         There were voices talking to him, concerned and angry, but Spike didn’t know how to respond.  He didn’t recognize any of the faces around him through the tears, and any time his brain tried to form coherent words, it was like his skull was splitting in half.  They pulled at his hair, and he felt strands of it fall around his shoulders.  No, they couldn’t do that to him.  That was bad!  They couldn’t cut his hair!  Why couldn’t they cut his hair?  Why was that bad?  Who were these people?

         “If you don’t respect the rules of this tribe, you don’t deserve to be a part of it anymore,” was the last thing he remembered hearing, before he was shoved out into the dark night air, but even that was taken away from him a few moments later.  He stumbled a little ways, clutching onto trees so as not to lose his balance, before he fell unconscious.

 

—

 

         He woke up the next morning in the woods.

         He wasn’t quite sure why he was there.  Or what had happened.  Or who he was.  Or anything, really.  He knew he was a dark elf.  He could tell that plain as day.  His hair was short, and for some reason that made him uncomfortable.  He wasn’t sure why.  He played around with the short strands, concluding that he would become used to it after a while.  As for the woods, he didn’t recognize where he was, but for some reason he felt comfortable here.  Safe, perhaps.  Maybe he had always lived in the woods, and this was his home.

         His stomach growled and interrupted his thoughts.  Food would be important to have.  Water, too.  So, he shakily got to his feet and began wandering around in search of sustenance.  It was only then that he ran into someone else.

         It was another dark elf, with white hair that fell down to his shoulders.  His violet eyes looked reassured as he sighed a breath of relief.

         “Thank goodness I found you,” the dark elf said.  When there wasn’t a response, he looked up at the elf before him, who had an absent, confused look on his face.

         “Who are you?” he asked and raised his eyebrows.

         “Spike, it’s me. Moose? Your brother?” the dark elf said.

         “I don’t have a brother.  I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Spike said, shaking his head and smiling a bit at how ridiculous this drow sounded. 

         “C’mon, seriously?  You’re not that angry at me, are you?  Look, I had to get the Elders off my trail and—"

         “I don’t understand what you mean,” Spike said, “I’ve never met you before in my life, I don’t know where you’re from, and I don’t know who the Elders are.  You’re spouting nonsense.” Moose’s eyes widened with horror as he realized the mistake of what he’d done.  He blinked back tears as he looked down the deer antler in his hand that he had managed to sneak out here.  He held out the deer antler to Spike.

         “What is that?  Why are you giving it to me?” he asked, looking cautiously at it.  Moose sighed as his stomach stirred with a mix of guilt and anxiety.

         “Your name is Spike.  This is a magical sacred artifact that belongs to you.  Don’t let anyone take it from you or convince you anything else about it.  You need to run, now, and get far away from here.” he said.

         Spike looked intently at this strange dark elf standing in front of him.  He seemed upset and wouldn’t look him in the eyes.  He didn’t know who this drow was, but something in his gut told him that he could trust him.  He took the deer antler and took one last look at the dark elf standing before him.  Spike pitied him, and got anxious at the thought of leaving him, which was ridiculous.  Spike didn’t know him.  Never had, and never will.

         So, he turned and headed in the opposite direction, without turning back, and did what the dark elf instructed.

 

…

 

         It wasn’t until many months and thousands of miles later that he came across another kingdom.  On one of his visits into the kingdom from his camp in the woods, he happened to be in the right place at the right time.

         “Oi! Hey, you! The dark elf lad over there!” a voice cut through the crowd.  Spike turned towards the voice and pointed towards his chest.

         “Yeah, you!  Can you give me a hand?” the voice was coming from a small goblin, about a third of Spike’s height.

         “Alright,” Spike shrugged.

         “The name’s Gorkks.  Just grab one of those crates there and run.  The guards will be here soon.  I’m right behind you,” the goblin said, and Spike did as he was told.

 


End file.
